Two Tales

 

The big difference, however, is that market entities deal with each other only through voluntary transactions, so both sides must agree that they are better off for the transaction to occur. The threat of force stands behind transactions with government entities.--Holcombe

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The British Government sent 470 delegates on a 5,000-mile round trip to the Cop29 climate summit in Azerbaijan.
The delegation, including seven ministers, more than 100 civil servants, and two official videographers prompted allegations of net zero “hypocrisy” against the Government. The UK registered 470 delegates to the summit, according to figures reported by the Mail on Sunday, compared with 405 from the US, 437 from Italy, and 115 from France.

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Two Tales

Modern life has turned over two cases with a strange, common thread: the healthcare murder and the Biden pardon. Both acts, one criminal and shameful, one just shameful, have stimulated peculiar sidebars. Some commentators say, 'the insurance industry is abusive,' the Biden apologists say, 'one must empathize with a father's grief.'

This is not simply an argument that two wrongs make a right, it is a muddying moral equivalence that blunts ethical code. and law. This is the hallmark of vigilanteism.

The vigilante does not demand justice, he demands satisfaction. As such, it is egocentric, and not ethical. Any greater vision is subjugated to the demands of symbolism. This is the uncluttered pre-civilized mind.

Civilization sees the individual as such, not as a representative of some larger concept or group. So Hatfield will always hate McCoy and Montague will hate Capulet. The bigot never bothers to see an individual. Civilization changes that. The individual suddenly has value and is no longer reduced to a symbol or a representative.

The healthcare murderer and the child pardoner sidestep the fragile construct of the law. They sacrifice the law--and us--for a businessman or a relative. They demand a 'bigger picture' that includes those dark pre-civilization days of dehumanizing groupthink. 

Neither is Antigone.